Category: Audition Advice (Page 3 of 6)

It’s Better if You Hug It + a hot take on “overdone”

May 9, 2023 / dancallaway

I was going to post today about whether or not you should sing overdone songs at auditions.

That’s a very short email, I realized.

The answer?

Yes, go ahead.

If you sing it great, and it’s right for the thing you’re going in for, by all means sang it.

There’ve been folks who’ve changed my mind about songs because they dared to sing something they loved that was on the apparent do-not-sing list.

(I started re-liking the song “No One Else” from Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812 after I heard current Elon student Sara LiBrandi sing it from her heart at her program audition.)

So, please, if you sing it great, just go ahead and sing it. Things are overdone for a reason.

Now that THAT sigh of relief has left your body, one thing from my heart to yours + a couple of videos.

From my ? ==> your ?: It works out better when you hug the version of you that’s reading this right now.

You might have a new-and-improved avatar of you working on your vision board, and that’s terrific. We love a good goal.

What I’ve found to increase the peace, relief, and ease factor when it comes to getting from A to B, though, is meeting the now-you with love.

Anything you want to change has a story, and it’s much more likely to cooperate with you when you meet it with understanding.

This shows up all the time in the studio —

“Ah! If I could just get my _______ to RELAX!”

I want you to ask yourself the last time someone shouted at you to RELAX! Did it relax you?

Your jaw muscles might like to hold because when you were 9, your body figured out some kinds of expression weren’t safe, so your brilliant brain instructed your chewing muscles to do double duty and keep all that crying the big people called “excessive” at bay.

Now you can’t quite figure out why those muscles won’t just release like your voice teacher tells you to. Meanwhile, those cells are like, “Whadaya mean let go? We been holding on for dear life since third grade!”

Every pattern we adopt has a story.

If you want to change a pattern, take the time to meet the current one with compassion. It might have some useful insight for you.

I’m telling you so I can tell me. We’re in this together.

And in case you missed these this week,

Here’s a video of me walking around beautiful springtime Boston talking about a good way to slow your brilliant brain down when it’s trying to win the Boston Marathon and get some peace and clarity talking again.

And I put this up on the IG and FB this week, but here’s James May and me making music together at my BoCo studio recital. James is a world class musical director, and I had the privilege of working with him a lot in Los Angeles. This is “A Bit of Earth” from The Secret Garden.

And here’s Jude and me repotting a couple of plants on the deck today.

And always remember — there’s only one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,

Dan

Standing Out and Other Mistakes — How college musical theatre parties and Ford Broncos teach you about life navigation

May 2, 2023 / dancallaway

By the time I got to college, many folks had told me how gregarious, extraverted, outgoing, and, ahem, charismatic, I was.

I mean, I had provided my Anglo Saxon pentecostal meets Topol impression lens to the role of Tevye in Mt. Airy High School’s production of Fiddler on the Roof, and there were those speech/essay contest blue ribbons I kept pulling down.

The magnetism evidence piled up everywhere.

When I rolled into Elon College’s musical theater program in 1996, I figured I’d keep winning the charisma wars like I had in Surry County.

However, my Dale Carnegie assessment score plummeted at my first musical theatre party.

Who were these people with their signed Playbills, multiple pictures with Bernadette Peters, and cast album CD collections?

And how were they so… so resonant? How could they talk over ALL the other people? And how were they making EVERYONE laugh?

(And why was there smoking? There was so much smoking.)

I didn’t even enter the party attention arena.

In this character shoe cage match, I was a back-row ensemble member still faking time steps. A BYO-Jane Austen novel attendee pretending to enjoy my tepid can of Icehouse in the corner.

Standing out in this environment meant you had to be louder, faster, funnier, and I was outa my league from the get.

We actors get the message early on: You have to stand out!

So, like any logical human, we set out to compete like we’re at a gathering where it’s normal to shout, “a 5-6-7-8” and three quarters of the room bursts into the opening sequence of A Chorus Line.

Once you start to compete, though, that’s the moment you get lost.

And I mean this in two ways.

ONE. You get lost in a crowd.

In college, after I learned what a jazz shoe was, I started to pick up a thing or two about dancing.

One thing I never really conquered, though, was trusting myself to pick up choreography.

I always watched the better dancers to double check that I had it right.

And that put me a half-count behind.

It also meant that my attention was on the dancer I’d decided was better than me and not on my own work.

If you’re busy looking around you to compare and follow, there’s no way you can get down into your own work and find out what your own point of view is.

Don’t get me wrong. Look around. Notice who you admire. Take in their influence.

But your work is about sharing what rings authentically in you, not scanning outside trying to crack a code.

TWO. You lose your actual way.

If you always look around, assess what you think everybody is doing and how you can do that better, there’s no room for you to check in with you.

You could spend several years trying to fill-in-the-blank better than someone only to find when you check in with you, your heart was longing to go a different direction.

It’s like you’re driving to New York City. You see a cool new sky blue Ford Bronco in front of you, and you’re all like, that’s a lot cooler than this serviceable Accord with more than 200K miles on it.

Before you know it, you just decide to follow that Bronco. Then, three hours later, you’re like, “How did I end up in Allentown, PA?”

Just because you’re on the same highway as someone else doesn’t mean you have the same destination.

When you navigate based on what everyone else is doing, you’re going to end up at some unintended Wawas. (Though that is a good opportunity to pick up a sammie and some Tastykakes.)

Bottom Line: standing out (big air quotes there) is an exercise in futility.

Here’s what do do instead:

??‍♀️ Build your skill every day (this is confidence and competence.)

? Check your heart. How can you walk through the world as open and loving as possible today?

?? Then, put your body in the place and do the thing.

After a while, your people at the party will recognize you, ask if you want some of the good stuff they hid in the back of the fridge, and you’ll talk about Stephen Sondheim.

That’s it: Build your skill. Hug and shine your heart. And put your body in the place and do the thing.

Because you know what I’m gonna say. There’s only one you. Folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,

Dan

Phantom Confessions — finally coming clean about this

April 18, 2023 / dancallaway

I’m going to tell you some of the ways I shenanigized and monkeyed around during my tenure with The Phantom of the Opera Music Box Company.

It all started my first night on at the Fabulous Fox in St. Louis.

I’d layered on all my costumes, shown old Raoul the music box in the auction, and entered successfully into the opera rehearsal scene as the Lion Man.

Then the ballet drop fell. Ballerinas screamed and spun, and Meg sang, “He’s here! The Phaaantom of the Operaaaa!”

?”He is with us, it’s the ghost!” we echoed.

A member of the ensemble crossed directly to me just as her blocking dictated, reached out, and whispered, “Who you gonna call?”

Not seven minutes into my phirst Phantom, I had to turn upstage.

Then there was the issue of the gun.

I played the guy in the orchestra pit who shoots at (and misses) the Phantom in Act 2.

The stage manager showed me how to cock and shoot the gun in rehearsals. I grew up around guns being the country boy I was, and the method for this old prop wasn’t intuitive, but I did my best. (I was also a rule follower and a good grade getter.)

My first week on was not a success.

Five shows went by when I couldn’t fire the gun. Poor Raoul had to change lines.

There was even a matinee when I managed to drop both blanks ONTO the floor of the orchestra pit.

CLINK. CLINK.

In the middle of the only talky scene.

Glen the conductor hated that gun (and me that week).

Charlene the stage manager offered me a bottle of Veuve Clicquot if I could get through a whole week of successful cock-n-fires.

She also called me Stinky because the gun smelled of sulphur.

Finally, I just asked the prop master Dean who handed me the gun every night to show me how he’d do it.

He was a Carolina boy like me. He grabbed the handle, pulled back the hammer with his thumb, released it and handed it back.

My redneck instincts: validated.

I never missed a shot after that. (Except the matinee in Peoria when I made a premature costume change and missed my entrance for the other gun-fire scene. Sorry again, Raoul.)

Other naughties included but weren’t limited to:

A fellow fop in the opera scene assigning me characters for every show. I clandestinely peppered in John Wayne, Tarzan, and Stevie Wonder into my interpretations.

This practice ended when one of my choices made them laugh too much to sing their first line, and we narrowly avoided the stage manager’s ire.

I was also introduced to three games by a particularly seasoned ensemble member:

Anticipation; Delayed Reaction; and Spin like a Ballerina When You’re Scared.

You can do the math on the outcomes of this Meisner/Stanislavsky hybrid work.

Truth is this: Being a committed and excellent ensemble member is hard.

And when I got up to shenanigans, it diminished the show for the audience and for me.

Sure, I look back on some of that, and it’s funny. I laugh.

But a lot of it? Yeah, I don’t feel proud and satisfied.

This is the thing that’s hard to remember as a member of a long-running show:

Just because it’s old news to you doesn’t mean it’s not mind-blowing to someone else.

That ringing 8-part harmony may be played out for you, but it could be the most beautiful thing the high school kid who plopped down his savings from double shifts at Panera ever heard.

The place where we get tripped up is this —

We think we have to re-create that experience of offer ourselves every time when we deliver these familiar songs, lessons, or lines.

We don’t.

We just have to remember that for the one we’re communicating with, this could be life-changing.

The other takeaway from my failings in professionalism:

If it’s worth saying, it’s worth repeating.

If you’re writing something, teaching something, singing something — if it’s good and worthy, it’s worth repeating.

I’ll guarantee you everybody wasn’t listening first time.

In fact, you probably weren’t, either.

I can’t tell you how many times I will teach a song in lessons, and I’ll say, “Hey wait a minute!” after years of hearing a certain lyric. This happens all the time.

The repeated and the ordinary things in life hold treasures.

So, I want to encourage you to walk a familiar path today and look with new eyeballs.

Take a sec to smell your coffee. If your body feels ok when you get out of bed, take a moment to think what a miracle it is to have a working body.

And if you’re singing a song in your audition book that feels tired to you but always works, take some time to re-listen. You may hear a lyric for the very first time.

A good question that helps me:

What’s the most satisfying way I can work on this?

That’s what I hope for you — that your work will be satisfying and fill you up like a delicious plate of creamy risotto.

You’re worth that satisfaction.

And always remember, there’s only one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,

Dan

PS The MFA Pedagogy Students and I went on a See-Your-Boston-With-New-Eyes scavenger hunt last week. (It was too beautiful to sit inside.)

PPS In case you missed it last week, remember I made this free video series for you:

7 Mistakes Smart Theatre Singers Make — and the Easy Ways to Fix Them

Get instant access to this free video series to get your voice unstuck and flow the truth outa your face with freedom, confidence, and joy. Click here.

The One Thing that Changes Everything — Jack’s superpower ?? (yours too) + the celeb who could change your acting forever

March 21, 2023 / dancallaway

Jack was in the hospital when he found out he’d won a place in Boston Conservatory’s Musical Theatre Program.

He’d also gotten some news he wasn’t expecting: a Type 1 Diabetes diagnosis.

This Disney-devoted Marvel memorizer had to navigate huge life changes and adjust to a rigorous training program in a new city that definitely wasn’t Big-D-Little-A-Double-L-A-S.

After the BoCo Sorting Hat placed Jack in my studio (Ravenpuff), a mentor of his emailed to say — “Hey! Dan Callaway teaches there. You should try to study with him.”

That mentor was Jim May who’d music directed me in LA (and hosted the best singing soirees at his house in Granada Hills.)

He’s flying to Boston for our studio recital this April! ??

Love synchronicity hugs like that.

Back to Jack —

Jack’s shown up to lessons dizzy, exhausted, fighting to get his eyes to focus, and battling an often tricky Dexcom sensor.

(I have a terrible habit of clapping Jack on the shoulder where it’s injected 🙁 Sorry, Jack.)

He’s sung exercises leaning against the piano to stabilize himself, worked through lessons in a chair, and done about every other thing he can to get his body into the studio at his lesson times.

Some days, I’ve asked if he wanted to take a break or go grab an egg sammie. He always wants to work.

There’ve also been days when he’s texted me from an Über on the way to the Joslin Diabetes Center because his levels were going nuts.

I have no idea what managing diabetes feels like–

what it’s like to monitor your glucose all day, callous your fingertips from constant pricking, navigate sudden dizziness, or worry about your vision going haywire while the best docs tell you they’re not sure why.

I looked at Jack this week as he juggled the 17 directives I was twanging across the piano at him, and my heart filled up with admiration.

I stopped and said, “Jack, you know how courageous you are? The things you overcome just to show up in the room are huge, and I think you’re a big deal.”

I wiped a tear, and we went back to sticking out our tongues and making Elmo sounds.

But Jack makes me stop and say thank you that my body’s healthy.

It’s a miracle to hear music, walk the 5 flights from the basement to my studio, and play wrong notes and cuss.

My Grandma Frances always said, “If you have your health, you have everything.”

I remember her words when I look at Jack with his eyes on what he loves to do more than anything — make folks laugh and feel better.

He could be the one feeling like crap, and he makes sure you’re okay.

Jack reminds me that showing up is seriously it.

Nothing else happens if you don’t.

Just put your body in the place, and do the thing.

After a while, folks’ll notice and trust you. Most importantly, though, you’ll notice and trust yourself. You’re the one who shows up.

Lately I’ve been getting quiet and listening into my guts about what the next stage of my life’s supposed to be about. I’ll pray, “What do I need to know?”

I’m getting this answer: Share.

Okay. Yes.

And sharing means showing up. That’s why I’m rolling into your inbox on a Monday.

Here’s another truth — lots of times, I’m scared to share.

I make videos I delete. I write posts and leave them in the drafts folder. I want to hide.

You got that too? Times you want to hide?

Good — we have something we can both practice: show up and share.

Just get your body in the room.

You’ve picked up things over the years that’ll help folks. What if you don’t bring those to the table?

And remember, feeling afraid is required for courage.

I bet if you go back and think about the folks who’ve made a difference to you — how much of that was just because they showed up? What would happen, do you think, if you did that for you? And in turn for us?

Because you know what I’m fixing to say — there there’s only one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

love much,
dan

ps Are you as excited as I am about Ted Lasso’s Season 3 starting up??

If you’re having a hard time waiting for the week-to-week episode drip-drip, may I recommend Shrinking? 30-minute episodes packed with heart, humor, humanity, and any other H-word that brings you joy.

And if you’ve never hopped on the Luther train, get to the station. It’s so good.

(There’s a new Netflix film, and if you haven’t watched the show, I recommend you mark some time in your binge calendar to get up to speed.)

Melissa and I re-watched the first episode the other day and due to parenting exhaustion and amnesia, it was like a whole new experience!

(And whenever a student needs an imaginary scene partner for their love/heartbreak song, I regularly recommend Idris Elba. I’m not wrong.)

Don’t look up there — free advice (solicited and un-), sidewalk hubris, and cake

January 31, 2023 / dancallaway

There’s a spot on Lansdowne Street right below Fenway Pahk’s Green Monstah. The pavement crack you avoid (for your mother’s spinal wellbeing) is covered in pigeon dookie.

I avoid this side of the street when I race-walk to the commuter rail station after convincing myself yet again that an 11-minute walk only takes 8. (and don’t wanna get kicked off the express for leaping on a moving train again.)

But yeah, the south side of Lansdowne —

It’s shady, so that means cold in winter. Uncheck.

It’s narrow, so awkward shoulder navigation with Sawx pilgrims. Uncheck.

And there’s the pigeon toilet problem.

The first time I strolled that side, I noted white-grey splats Jackson Pollocking the pavement, and though I knew it was grave folly, I looked skyward.

Just looked right on up — in case there was a fresh row of pigeons ready to evacuate on my Warby Parkers.

Luckily, the fowl ball club was scavenging Sausage Guy roll leftovers. But still. Poop on the ground? Maybe keep walking and don’t look up.

I was a deft doodoo dodger that day. But there were other times when feces found me.

One self-important pre-audition stroll in Central Park, I was saying my mantras and asking God to grant me superpowers when I felt a smatter-patter on my right backpack strap. When I noticed the dirty WhiteOut offering on my shoulder, I did have the good sense to laugh.

But yeah. We don’t walk near the doo, no no no no.

THEN — the other day I was giving my best Richard Simmons to the train (more time delusions) and saw a young woman navigating the path below the high northern stands.

Sure enough, she noticed the Columba caca, and just like I did that day, she paused. And performed a thorough rafter check.

She survived her hubris unscathed, but yeah: When there’s birdy turdy at your feet, keep your eyes groundward — if you have to get #2’d on, you want it on the noggin and not in the nostril.

Sometimes I wish there were a universal manual with clear-cut directions like —

Avoid the the Green Monstah undahbelly.

Straightforward, right?

Or when you learn to sing show tunes for folks. Things like —

Give your eyes a break every now and then from that spot on the wall they told you to pretend was a person. Looks stalkery.

or

Most times, you need less of what you’re calling breath support.

or

You’re gonna need some different vowels. Well-meaning folk told you to sing like you speak, but physics says nope.

You got something you wish somebody would just TELL you how to do? Hand you the secret dog-eared manual with the step-by-step?

While I can’t help you with dishwasher repair, I’ve ?ed plenty a bed when it comes to all things song and story (and helped several others change their sheets.)

So, I know some things.

And I’m a teachery sort, so I suffer from an incessant need to tell folks things I know.

My family loves it.

So, can you help me?

Here’s how —

Email me your voice mystery.

Hit reply, and say, “Dear TeacherDan, The singery thing I’ve never gotten a satisfying answer to is ….”

And let me know.

Noise making, audition room consternation, what am I even doing? ?

Send it my way.

I’ll write you back or make you a lil video that’ll scratch my unsatisfiable itch to share info.

This is for you if you’ve ever been like, “I wish I could just ASK a voicey person how to fix this and they’d answer my question without me plopping down a large slice of my rent.”

Seriously, get out your fingies and type your burning question.

And if you don’t remember anything else from today’s letter, remember this:

There’s only one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,
dan

ps Here are answers to questions you didn’t even ask me — all baking related.
The best chocolate cake recipe you’ll ever make. (It’s Ina Garten)
The best biscuit recipe you’ll ever bake. (not even from a Southerner ?)
And more baking — a terrific last minute delicious cheaty bread recipe.

pps You wanna hear some beautiful straight-from-the-heart sangin? Look what the YouTube algorithm delivered up to me this week: “She Used to Be Mine” sung by Sara Bareilles and Brandie Carlile.

ppps And sirriously. Write and ask anything singy, auditiony, your relationship to music-y. I’m HERE for it.

Choreplay ? — dishwasher’s empty. laundry’s folded. Alexa, play Barry White.

January 24, 2023 / dancallaway

Melissa and I can get all flirty birdy kicking around the house.

Ewwww, Dad. I know.

But I’m lucky. When someone tells you they like how those jeans look, it’s nice.

These days, such flirt-portunities appear like fleeting comets. Most of the time we can’t hear each other talk.

Someone’s being a T-Rex, demolishing the other’s train, or belting “The Nutcracker March.”

I see Melissa’s lips move and hear sounds, but intelligible phonemes? No chance.

So– when there’s quiet —

When “Bluey”’s on, the boxed wine flows, the spaghetti burbles, and “A Case of You” twings through the Bose, we shnuggle by the stove and share spicy idears about what could happen after the boys go to bed.

Then we rendezvous at 8pm in our noiseless house… (except for our neighbors. What’s going ON over there?) …we rendezvous craving just one thing: induced coma.

Friends try to tell you how it is keeping young children alive, but just like the MLM pitch your friend assured you was an antioxidant juice party, you don’t know ’til you’re there.

So, I stoke the hottie home fires in other ways:

Step 1: I get up before the sun.

Step 2: get some breakfast in the crew

Step 3: may do a load of laund-a-ry.

Step 4: unload the dishes, put the flatware in the drawer

Step 5: Get dinner in that Instant Pot jive

Step by step gonna get to you girl. ?

Then my phone BLOWS UP allll day ? about how hawt that toasty load of laundry is while the house gets aroma(n)tic with my special slow-cooker turkey chili spice blend. ?

I’m good at doing stuff for other folks.

I’m crap at doing stuff for myself.

If it weren’t for Melissa, I’d rarely wash my face, and I’d sprout Christopher Lloyd professor-brows from my frontispiece like a possessed wire fox terrier.

You in this club, too?

Not the Doc Brow Crowd.

The Doing Good Things for Yourself Oh Wait I Forgot Society. The dehydrated, crusty-knuckled, still-gotta-pee brigade.

Oh, you’re the treasurer. And volunteered to take minutes. Yes, I see you.

Ahem. May I ask you to put down your Robert’s Rules of Order for a sec?

? Thanks — Now — can you think back to a far away time and tell me —

What’s the last good/nourishing thing you did for you?

(I’m telling myself it’s the bowl of Honey Nut Cheerios I’m eating (I even added roasted almonds), but that’s not what I’m getting at.)

What’s something you’ve done for you that’s investy?

I’m asking you because we’re here by the coffee percolator at the Society meeting, and you might be saying things to yourself like —

❌ I don’t actually need that class at Jen Waldman’s studio my friend raved about.

? I should figure that out on my own. I don’t need Mike Ruckles to tell me my breath’s jacked. I already got a BFA. And there’s YouTube.

? I can’t know this is worth my cash. I got inflated city rent to pay and $10 eggs to buy. Besides, my vocal coach took two phone calls MID-SESSION last time.

I understand. (That vocal coach bit really happened. More than once.)

But sirrously, remember the last time you did the investy thing?

Did you get surprised? You learn an unexpected oh-yeeeaah? Or did the path light up showing you a step you couldn’t see before?

Or maybe you felt that honey-buzz in your guts because you did something kind. For you.

Years ago, I plopped down money I was scared to spend to coach with LA Chutspa Menschela Barbara Deutsch when I needed to grow my studio biz. Like, exorbitant-interest-wolves-at-the-door need.

She told me two things that cleared the fog and helped me breathe again; and 14(?) years later I keep those tools top of the box.

Hey, I have an idea. ?

In case you feel your heart tapping you on the shoulder saying:

❤️‍?: “I wanna feel freedom, release, express, get heard, enjoy, feel great, heal, and sing some tunes!

“Oh, and singing tickles our vagus nerve and helps us chill the eff out. It’s science!”

You got choices:

? hop in the shower and belt “Total Eclipse of the Heart.”

☎️ call your in-network voice care provider and set up a consultation

or

⭐️?⭐️ email me back.

While skewl has me spring semester zany, and the Feb Special-Special crew is full, there remain some rare, cozy corners of my calendar waiting for us to nestle in and make shameless sounds.

You can celebrate like my friend David who SOS’d me on Instagram last month.

All I did was send him a 5 minute video with some idears. He just took it from there.

Or we can get in there all heart melty like I roll with the BoCo kids.

? This is why I’m the luckiest — I get to teach the best kids.

And there are the endless opportunities for grinning and belting like Michael Tatlock and I do on a Thursday evening:

The party’s hot, so get in here with us. nnn-ts nnn-ts nnn-ts ?

Before you know it, you’ll be getting all manner of vocal chore hacks, and like Ina Garten pouring a scalding pot of cavatappi into a colander for Jeffrey, you’ll muse amid the rising steam, “How easy was that?”

Just tickle this link or hit reply.

I’ll write you back, ask you questions, and we’ll work it all out.

Can’t wait!

And whatever scintillating chore you’re fixing to do right now, always remember, there’s one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Now go do something nice — for you! ?

love much,
dan

ps You know I wouldn’t leave you hanging about the vibrato-limp wrist connection. I also call it rubber chicken.

Here’s the video I sent to David.

pps The folks mentioned above are top notch.
Jen Waldman Studio — whole hearted acting/singing/artist training
Mike Ruckles Voice AND piano wowee zowee
and
Barbara Deutsch wise career coach and somebody you just wanna listen to ?

ppps Wait! You were gonna email me about that 1-on-1 time? Just click here and press send. I already wrote the email for you.

Just pissed in Plymouth — That’s not what a bowling pin’s for. And I want my money back on the New England summah.

November 29, 2022 / dancallaway

We visited Plymouth (the one with the Rock) last summer.

We saw the Mayflower

and the Moo-flower. Here are the boys and Gram.

We learned how the Wampanoag grew food and hollowed canoes.

We found out only rich pilgrims had floors, and Noah stumped one of docents with a 17th Century dental hygiene question. (Though her dialect and character commitment were impressive.)

The boys went deep on colonist cosplay,

and while Noah continued world building, Jude and I set up pins and a leather ball for a bowling game outside. Short-lived. (As was the knock-the-hoop-down-the-lane-with-a-stick game. Though Jude was impressed by my make-the-hula-hoop-come-back-to-you trick.)

Then, I managed a dispute over who would gallop on the one stick-horse to rule them all.

I finally sat my sweaty self down for a rest when a family festooned in LA Dodger gear rolled into the medicinal herb garden.

Two boys belonging to this gaggle picked up the bowling pins and the leather-bound ball.

And played baseball.

They pitched the ball and thwacked line drives that nearly decapitated the lavender shrubs.

Those implements were meant for King James era BOWLING!

Where was their parent????

Oh. There.

Snapping iPhone pics and chortling as if she were about to exclaim, “Now that’s what I call outside-the-bowl thinking!”

I gulped water from Jude’s Elmo cup and seethed in the mid-afternoon humidity. (New England was NOT coming through on my 85-degrees-tops summer dreams.)

But, seriously, what was my problem with these kids?

In our own house, we’ve tried to make the rules simple — “It’s okay unless it hurts people or property.”

These Blue-Crew-capped preteens were damaging neither. Not yet, anyway.

But, it felt disrespectful. Someone hand-made those pins and ball so kids could old-times bowl in the designated area, and these knuckle-noggins were rolling in like they owned the reproduction settlement.

Reminded me of bartending in London. I could hear a fellow American two streets away swaggering like the corrupt sheriff in a B-Western.

Oblivious to the culture they were visiting and barking questions like, “Hey, where’s the ice and my free refill? You don’t have to tip here, right? That’s cool.”

In both instances — bowling baseball and bothered British bartending — there was a common experience: stress, anxiety, and contraction.

These folks weren’t following my rules. And my rules rest on objective fact and acute observation, of course.

Those are bowling pins in Plymouth, therefore bowl.

This is London. Ice in your drink isn’t a given; you dry your clothes on a rack in the kitchen; and the time I saw the woman on the Tube silently mouthing the recipe for her Yorkshire pudding to the man opposite her gave me the hint to turn down the voice volume in most public spaces.

Ah! People!

Look behind you and hold the door if someone’s coming. If someone holds the door for you, say thank you. If someone lets you in front of them in traffic, throw up a hand. And for God’s sake, stop talking on your phone on the train! No one wants to hear you yammer all the way through Wellesley!

Here’s the ouchy part, though.

The ways I yell at these clue-free ingrates in my brain? Ever so clandestinely, those are the grumpy royal decrees I hand down to me.

To escape this tyranny, I just wanna find the nearest Mayflower. Only I can’t take a miserable, stormy voyage on a cramped ship away from myself.

That’s why there’s night cereal, YouTube, and podcasts.

When it comes to our singing, the rules get real mean.

That’s not the right sound.

I’m not breathing right.

My break is terrible.

I’m stuck! I’ll never stop thinking about my technique!

We stop ourselves from making a sound before we can even let one rough-draft through our body.

RULES!

Stuff needs to sound a certain way, and we need to make sure it’s gonna sound that way before it leaves our face.

Or else?

Embarrassment, feeling rejected, calling ourselves a failure, believing we’ll never get it. Telling ourselves we won’t gain the skills to express what we want when the adrenaline’s pulsing; therefore, we won’t be able to do the thing we dream about (and don’t reveal to anyone because they’ll think we’re crazy.)

It’s a self-perpetuating game of torture thought pinball.

How about this, though? What if you set the rule page aside?

What if you scrawled out that title with your favorite crayon and wrote, “Choices”?

Hmmmmm.

If I could make any sound here, what kind of sound would I choose?

What kind of breath would I take if I realized, “Well, if that’s love, it comes at much too high a coooooost?”

What if I could try different paths through the tricky pitches? And let myself fall and get up?

I wonder if there’s a way to think about technique AND the story in a both-and kind of situation.

When you ask questions like this, things lighten up, and you see places you can step. Before you know it, you’ve walked a few paces, and something that feels like fun and satisfaction bubbles up.

Me likey!

(And if you need specific help, email me for a lesson. I’m end-of-semester busy, but we’ll figure out a time. Just reply and ask.)

So, I invite you to notice this week.

When does your rule committee rear its many heads? Notice how it feels inside when you say things like “I would never….,” “Why would they do that?….” and “What’s WRONG with them?”

If you sit and watch for 9 seconds, you’ll prolly see where you berate you in similar fashion.

I’m realizing that 45% of my letters to you end up asking, “How are you talking to you?”

And it’s because it’s that important. The environment you cultivate in your own garden is everything when it comes to what kind of medicinal herbs you grow. Just look out for bowling ball line drives.

But yeah, just notice. Slow your breath. Soften your face. Melt your shoulders. And watch. Who do you like to slam the rules on? And where are you slamming them on yourself?

What if you wrote CHOICES in Sea Green at the top of your page and asked again?

Try it. And as my father-in-law says in his deep, Rhode Island baritone, “Enjoy. God bless.”

Because it’s true. There’s just one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing. And you’ll sing it with joy if you give your voice a chance to try a thing or three.

Love much,
dan

ps I’ve been enjoying these vintage playlists on YouTube — good for your holiday mixes in case Mariah’s invading your brain already.

pps Did I tell you I’m thankful for you? I am. ?

ppps Check out the Voice Collective on the IG — two terrific MFAs from the BoCo Cassi and Will laying out terrific tools, tips, and voicey love.

Who’s it for? — How I got more peace in my head and made the committee my ally.

November 22, 2022 / dancallaway

Journey with me back to my 20s any time I got an audition appointment. And witness me careen through the 12(?) stages of casting madness.

Stage 1: (212) area code calls. Hello, BroadWAY?

2: What’s the project? When’s it open? Who’s directing? What clever joke will I use for my custom opening night favors?

3: Wait, I have to learn the audition packet.

4: Better call my acting teacher, vocal coach, and numerologist.

5: Wait, look at the sides and the music!

6: Obsess. “What’re the table people looking for?” Examine the character breakdown forty-seven times to unlock the cypher that’ll reveal the perfect acting choices. (The numerologist didn’t come through on this.)

7: Finally, learn the material — enough so that I think that I know it, but not so much that I pour too much heart into it and get disappointed. And not enough to be in-my-body prepared when audition adrenaline kicks in. I can always blame it on self-sabotage.

8: Get to the audition right on time, maybe 90 seconds late depending on subways, humidity, and elevators.

9: Go in, smile, do the thing too quickly, look at my papers too much, and check in for signs of validation from the table folk.

10: Leave. Replay the event. Analyze every comment, question, and yawn for the next three days.

11: Check my phone every seven minutes to see if I missed a call from a (212).

12: The phone rings! It’s another audition. Repeat.

You need a breath? I do.

That’s better.

Last week, I chatted with a grad student who came to Boston from NYC; he was still adjusting to the SLOWER pace in Boston. I said I felt like New York was a neurosis nursery.

Not only were your hangups welcomed, but you could find two or three folks to sit with you at the Renaissance Diner and jib jab about commitment ambivalence for several hours.

The other morning on the train, I saw pieces of the afore-described brain torture show up.

I was batting around a couple book ideas. As I brainstormed, I wrote, “I’m afraid I’ll spin away at these ideas and then have nothing to SHOW for my work.”

Then I wrote down, “Show who?”

Well, I did write “whom,” but I didn’t wanna look like a complete grammar tool.

Isn’t that funny? That expression? “Nothing to show for all my hard work.”

Seriously, to whoM are we showing these outcomes?

The 12 steps of tryout crazy you read above — all of those brain-guish exercises rely on imagining that someone’s looking at you.

Many of us walk around with an imaginary committee opining on our choices, thoughts, and dreams.

Comprised of a junior high bully, the teacher who said the thing that time, a nemesis, and chaired by a composite Disney villain step-parent, this imaginary crew influences our day to day.

You get so used to them that you act (or don’t) anticipating their reactions.

It’s exhausting.

May I offer a suggestion?

Thank them.

Why did you make up this crew in the first place?

They probably started as your safety commission–a benevolent team that helped you navigate your early years: this big person likes it when you smile; this big person prefers you stay quiet; whatever you do, don’t tell this big person how you really feel about body piercings.

We become big people with our little people still running the back-end operations.

So, that’s why we say thank you.

This committee’s been seated to help us steer clear of all manner of life-threatening banishment.

Their continued influence does get us all wiggle waggle when our bodies look like adults, though, doesn’t it?

Rather than our vision resting calmly inside us looking out to the world, we jerk the cables around and lock in to selfie stick mode. Then we’re selfie stuck.

So here’s some help —

?? Breathe. Through your nose. Small inhale, long exhale. About a minute.

? Say, “Thank you, committee-that-I-made-up-to-keep-me-safe.”

? Face the lens outward.

Repeat as needed.

Then you’ll open-hearted see the outside while you have grace for your inside.

You’ll say things like, “Self, you get to try things out; Self, go ahead feel your feels; Self, it’s cool how you got to show up on the planet with all these other billions of selves.”

It’s a sweet place to be, I’ve found.

Hey, by the way, how’s your singing coming along? Are you enjoying it?

How’re your auditions in this post apocalypse self-tape landscape? (apocalypse in Greek actually means uncovering, and wow have things been uncovered, right?)

If you’ve hit snags, I can help you.

Email me and let me know what’s going on. Let’s talk.

If you’re in NYC or LA and want to meet with a real live human, I can recommend folks.

Or we can always hop on the Zoom and hash it out. Write me and ask me. Hit that reply button. I’m here for you.

Above all, remember that there’s only one you, and folks do indeed need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,

dan

ps Happened upon this Tim Minchin feature on YouTube (You may know him as the composer for MATILDA). He talks about the fame experience as well as the camera-turned-toward-you phenomenon. Interesting journey.

pps Have you ever read the Dr. Bronner’s soap bottle? I did yesterday, and one of the things encapsulates this dual-vision thing I’m talking about: “If I’m not for me, who am I? Nobody. Yet, if I’m only for me, what am I? Nothing. If not now, when?” He uses a lot more exclamation marks, though.

ppps And remember if you’re struggling with roadblocks vocal, creative, or career path, email me. Your singing can be free, your creativity flowy, and your work satisfying and clear. Tell me what’s going on. I’ll help you.

What’d I step on? ? Ack! wooop $*@# BLUUURG — I’m okaaaaay

June 8, 2022 / dancallaway

Noah and I explored the bracing waters of Nantucket Sound this week.

We examined seaweed samples, spied horseshoe crabs, and spotted shiny shells saying heeeeey from under the sparkly water.

It was one of those supersaturated perfection moments.

–where the self-conscious part of you wishes there were a photographer so you could prove to you friends, “No, really, this was the perfect New England Beach Day.”

This lil PB and J snacker’ll give you a clue.

Check that posture! He’s always calling out my slump.

While we waded, I was feeling the squishy sand through my toesies and pointing out a sailboat when my heel encountered something that was not seaweed.

Something springy, slimy, and vigorous writhed its way under the arch of my foot as if to say, “Hey! I’m LIVIN’ here!”

I acknowledged its communication with a falsetto WOOOP and a splashy hitch kick.

“Daddy! What’s wrong?” Noah asked.

“I stepped on something!” I explained.

“Daddy, why are we walking out of the water?”

“I need a lil break.”

“Daddy, what did you step on?”

“I don’t know, buddy.”

“What did it look like?”

“I didn’t stay close enough to look.”

As we toweled off on the beach, Noah was trying to work out why I hadn’t paused to observe the offended sea creature.

He repeated, “Daddy, what was that?” and “Daddy, were you scared?”

“Yes, buddy, I was startled. I didn’t know what I’d stepped on.”

I could see brain jigsaws interlock as he added, “Oh, Daddy’s scared of some things,” and “There’s stuff Daddy doesn’t know,” to his file labeled “The Way Things Are.” (Remember that from Babe?)

The ocean is unabsorbably beautiful, reminds you how teeny you are, and hosts all kinds of beings most human feet don’t wanna touch.

What you can’t see can be scawwy.

Like vocal technique.

It’s not straightforward like, “You put your left foot in, “ or “Press these two keys to start ‘Chopsticks.'”

It’s your whole body asking several muscle groups in your torso to play nice with largely involuntary muscles in and around your throat collaborating with more interdependent functions than you knew existed from your throat to your lips.

Your tongue alone has 8 different muscles.

Craysssy.

And it’s not like you can just look down and check if you’re doing it right.

The good news, though, is that there are indicators you can rely on, and there are things your body already knows how to do.

You wanna try an experiment and see?

(inspired by a terrific thesis by one of the MFA grads I got to advise. Thanks, Evan Rees.)

Here you go. (May wanna do this alone or on a busy street/train platform where no one will likely hear or care.)

? Pretend you’re holding a lil baby or a sweet animal, and sing a lullaby or a scale on [u]/oooo.
? Sing it in different keys, and notice that your voice naturally knows how to soothe this sweet lil being.
??‍♂️ Now pretend that a malevolent person tries to hurt your beebee.
? Call out, “Hey!”
?? Follow that impulse again, and slide ‘Heeey” on an interval, a fourth or a fifth.

What’d you notice?

Your voice is built-in ready when you’re meeting an unfolding sitch.

Your neurons know how to soothe a scared puppy and how to repel an invader.

This intel is crucial for theatre singers because the circumstances you’re imagining change the shape of your vocal tract.

Now, can you tell me something?

What is your number one vocal/storytelling question right now?

Because if you email me back and ask me, I can help you out.

I mean it. Hit reply and atst — vibrato, breathing, unmanageable stage farting. I’ve heard it all.

or

If you could make up a magical class or voice lesson, what problem would it solve for you?

It can be an impossible ask like, “I want my class to earn me a Pulitzer Prize for Journalism.” I mean, I can’t help you with that, but I do wanna know what your perfect class would do for you (or any singing storyteller you care about.)

Email me back and tell me.

And remember most of all, there’s only one you, and folks need to hear the story only you can sing.

Love much,

Dan

ps We’re heading back to regular land life today, so I’ll have some lesson avail. If you wanna sing freer, love what you’re doing, and bring joy to the room, email me back, and we’ll get to work.

pps Have you watched Joe Papp in Five Acts on PBS yet? I haven’t, but I plan to because all my snobby theayter friends say it’s terrific.

ppps This was clearly a working vacation since I also shot a series of looks for an upcoming fragrance they’ve asked me to promote. ? They’re still focus-grouping, but I think it’s gonna be called Panic at the Seashore.

Pizza Box Solution — and breakfast tricks for your singing AND ? poached eggs

June 2, 2022 / dancallaway

You know those “before” parts of infomercials where the person is having an existential crisis?

They’re trying to hang their trousers in their cluttered closet, and they trip over a stray belt and crumple into an anguish heap on the bedroom floor.

Or they’re incinerating a grilled cheese in an aluminum pan over a red-hot electric stove, coughing as they’re enveloped in smoke and clasping their ears as the alarm screams?

I found this one, too. This gent’s physical comedy skills are top notch. I give him a full Sham-wow.

We’ve all lived the problem stage before the low-laryngeal baritone voiceover says, “Introduuuuciiiing…..”

That’s a joke in our house when we’re struggle-bussing in plain view.

We say, “I’m an infomercial over here.”

That was me a couple mornings ago.

Even while it was happening, I said to Melissa, “I’m going to write about this.”

Then, later that afternoon, I said, “What was that thing that happened this morning when I said I was an infomercial?”

Neither of us could remember.

I clearly missed the one-time-offer for the memory supplement.

So, I decided I’d share three useful, unrelated tips that I DID remember this week that I thought would make your life (artistically and otherwise) better.

I mean, some of these are even directly related to singing and auditioning.

? Self-Tape Pizza Box Confidence and Freedom Booster

It’s very clear — the self tape is here to stay. I did one this very week.

I like to be off-book for an audition because, you know, looking up and acting and stuff.

But this week proved prohibitive in the grey matter department.

I wasn’t quite showtime ready, so I used my trusty cue-card sides trick.

I’m surprised I haven’t heard more people share this. Or maybe I’m not reading the right Broadway World online community chats.

This is what you do —

Type up your sides in bullshit-bullshit-MY-LINE-MY-LINE format. Make your lines super easily readable

Leave a gap in the middle of the page.

Print.

Dig that Amazon Prime box out of your recycling, cut out a paper-sized rectangle, and glue your sides to the cardboard.

Cut or Exacto knife a rectangle in the middle or side of your pages that’s bigger than your camera/phone lens.

Clip these to your phone or tripod in whatever creative way that allows your eye line to be just off camera to your scene partner. A strategically placed music stand can also save you rigging headaches here.

And hit record.

And don’t do too many takes. I find the second one is almost always the best one. You peak, and then it’s downhill a lot of the time.

If you’re a visual learner, this is what my last round looked like. And I didn’t need the cuts after all. I used a music stand.

? Audition Song What-Did-You-Have-for-Breakfast Trick

Your song coach told you that time to come up with an imaginary scene partner, pick a spot on the wall, pretend that was their face, and go.

Thing is, you and I have all seen the singers who get stuck on that spot and end up singing “On the Street Where You Live” like a stalker who finally cornered their stalkée.

In real life, our eyeballs move because our thoughts move.

So, here’s the tip to get you feeling more like a human when you sing.

Think about what you had for breakfast.

Now think about what you had for breakfast and notice where your eyeballs move.

That’s your memory spot, one of the places where your eyes move when you go into your internal brain space.

When you do that, I’m all like, “What’re you thinking in there?”

We go in there all the time to pull out memories, grab that word we can’t quite bring up in the rolodex, or to ruminate over that awkward interaction we had with the woman at the grocery store.

(Seriously, though, Melissa almost saw fisticuffs in the Market Basket produce department yesterday. Someone papaya-blocked somebody, I guess. I don’t have to tell you people done lost they mind these days.)

Back to your breakfast.

Yeah, make your memory eyeball spot a frequently visited friend.

Another cheap trick aspect of this — if you haven’t had time to do proper homework on your material (or you’ve practiced professional procrastination), this is a good way to allow some specifics from your subconscious to populate your storytelling.

Just be prepared for random thoughts about pop tarts or second-day T-shirts with suspect pit smell to emerge from the mind sea.

??? Sometimes you gotta pick up two handfuls of dead leaves and throw them back.

I took the boys to the town forest yesterday to search for the witches’ caves.

I think they’re cute.

Noah discovered the joy of picking up dirt and leaves and throwing them at Daddy.

Usually down the back of my cargo camos when I was bending down to pick Jude up from his latest rock-trip.

“Noah, stop!” my humorless, tired morning self said.

He couldn’t stop laughing. And throwing more leaves.

So…

I remembered my days as a kid when we turned the tobacco field behind our house into a GI Joe war zone and had dirt clod fights. The furrows made good trenches, and we’d hurl dried clumps of red clay at each other hoping there wasn’t too sharp a rock hiding inside.

It was good, dirty fun.

And a laundry nightmare for my mom.

But I remembered. And it was on.

We ran our way out of the woods hurling leaves at each other and laughing all the way.

Well, except for the time Noah kept throwing dirt down my pants, and I got angry that he wouldn’t stop, took a wrong turn, panicked a little, told everybody to just hush for a second, and had to get out my phone to figure out which way south was.

Other than that, it was a blast. And there was a lot of dirt to scrub out of heads at bath time.

The moral — when would a good ole yes-and serve the situation?

Later that day, Noah said, “Daddy, I loved it when you started playing with the leaves with us. Daddy, why’d you do that?”

Note to self— maybe check for more opportunities to chill out and have a lil basic fun.

There you go.

Next time you’re feeling all

Take some time to

? chuckle at self

?✂️ organize your self-tape supply closet

? practice thinking about what you had for breakfast

and

? be on the lookout for quality leaf fight opportunities

And in the meantime, remember there’s only one you, and folks need to hear the song only you can sing.

LOVE MUCH (I’m belting),

Dan

ps speaking of breakfast, I tried this Julia Child trick for poached eggs, and after a couple of operator errors, I’m here to report it works well.

Pro tip, use a kitchen towel to help you push the safety pin into the egg. You’ll see.

pps Here’s some history on the witches’ caves in our town forest.

ppps Remember if you need any lessoning or vocal troubleshooting this summer, I’m zoomable. Just email me back here, and we’ll set up a time for you. I’m here if you need me. ?

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